We do not dance for death

June 16th,Youth Day to many is a celebration of our freedom.Sadly many of our youth today don’t even know the stories.

Today’s post is not one that I would normally post.However my personal profile is full of it, so as my 2 year blogday tm(birthday of my blog in July) is fast approaching I would like you to see a side of me that you don’t get to see often.

Although I didn’t live in that time and wasn’t affected by apartheid, like, many, over the years have told me.I’m still affected though!June 16th 1976 was a profound day in the history of our youth of the time ,it is when the riots took a turn and they fought hard.They fought hard for our freedom and to leave a legacy for their kids. Most of the parents of these teens hated what they were doing and they even got a hiding when they got home after being brutally attacked by the apartheid police,for joining the riots,but,they fought.

The Struggle Continues By Sean Nefdt(my daddy)

Today we can do whatever we want whenever we want and people can tell us to get over it ,all because the youth fought for us.This is their legacy.

Fast forward 20 years after apartheid and we are free ,or are we. We have freedom of movement,freedon of career choice,just freedom and the right to anything and everything but are we really free?
No,we are not.Why? We still remained in the slums ,while you still have the privellage of your fancy schools,fancy house and no worries of debt or how you are going to pay for your university fees. Us on the other hand,the minute we turn 18 we have to go find a job because things in the house is on such a level that we can’t afford anything else or even worse we have to sometimes take out loans for our parents because we are the only ones with good credit. Nothing was given to us when apartheid was abolished you kept it all.

This should be our fight!We should be fighting for economic freedom!(no this is not a advert for the EFF lol) We shouldn’t be running to the stadium on this day to go party with Chomee and dance the day away.We should be in Bontheuwel watching the screening of Action Komnandant.We should be planning our revolution,but haibo we are too busy. We should be networking,discussing and strategising on how to become and strive to be employers and not employees.It’s nothing to complain about unemployment but what are we doing to create jobs?
We have to be working on a way to eradicate all this hate,if you know me,you will know I am the first one to stand up and fight for the right for/of a POC(person of colour) as the fight against white privilege and hate speech continue. This is a plea to my generation and those that have jobs in government sector especially POC let’s do what we need to do, to ensure that these stereotypes of POC does not continue.

Let us support each other the same way Penny Sparrow has been supported or the lass from the whole waitress saga. Let’s fight for us, so we can leave a legacy of economic freedom.We can only achieve this by #supportlocal ,buying and supporting local products and sevices.Let’s not judge people black, white or brown by the colour of their skin(because we don’t have pink and purple people in the world) but rather by their actions as an individual. Let’s us not generalise because just like we have POC that have gone rogue we also have white people doing the same thing. We as POC have achievedmsny things in the fight to set things right but in this we have also formed relationships with “white” people that are good. Let us still stand up for our people of colour even though we get labelled. I was actually kicked out of a female empowerment group because I was being “racist” by standing up for our government and stating that contrary to popular belief South Africa is a better place than it was in apartheid(yes their are people who believe it is not) These are the hard truths and a bitter pill to swallow but it is the truth. Many of you may or may not agree with me but that is your prerogative.

Let us take today and instead of seeing it as just another public holiday,let’s have the discussions that will move us forward as a society that sees beyond colour.

There will probably be many edits on this post throughout the day
As I have so much to say but am just struggling with getting it across and on to your screens for your reading pleasure. Please engage in my comments section below and let’s start the conversation.

6 thoughts on “We do not dance for death”

As a person that was part and parcel of the struggle for freedom, lots of things have changed for the better , there is abundant opportunity to poc’s but the resources remains in the power of the connected few , we need to actively debate and engage the government of the day , after 23 years in power very little have changed for the poorest of the poor , we had high hopes but alas many of the ideals have not yet come to realization, we need to debate harshly how we can achieve true emancipation for all our peoples, as we have done in the 80’s,we need to see pass colour pass labels , and need to acknowledge that we all South African and African irrespective of colour creed or religion , we need to emancipate our thoughts, and change our own thinking before Africa can be liberated Alurta Continua

You are right. It all starts with poc supporting each other. As an entrepreneur I see how ‘friends’ will rather take their business to someone from a white area because of the prestige that comes along with it. We if can be proud of who we are and where we come from things can change. Let’s be who we are and not try to immitate people who oppressed us.